


Just Business

by Eustacia Vye (eustaciavye)



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-18
Updated: 2010-10-18
Packaged: 2017-10-12 18:28:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/127781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eustaciavye/pseuds/Eustacia%20Vye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eleven years ago, Ariadne left Arthur. She never expected to ever see him again.</p><p>For the inception_kink prompt: <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/inception_kink/11005.html?thread=22317053#t22317053">Years later, Arthur is hired as for an Extraction job and the mark is Ariadne.</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Business

"Hello, Ariadne."

Ariadne froze. She hadn't heard that voice in years, but sometimes she still dreamed of it. Sometimes, in her dreams, she had chosen a different path, and they were still together, still working jobs. That had been years ago, and he had made his position clear when she left. He wouldn't seek her out, wouldn't stop her from leaving. It had always been her choice, always.

She slowly turned to face him. "Arthur."

He looked pretty much the same. Dark hair slicked back, dark eyes, sharp suit. A few lines around the corners of his eyes, deeper scowl lines, but ultimately still the same.

"I see you still remember me."

They were standing in the empty workshop at the architecture firm she worked in. As usual, she was the last to leave, and now she wished was less of a perfectionist. "What are you doing here, Arthur?"

"I can't visit an old friend?"

Something in her chest twisted at the words. "You made it clear when I left we weren't friends anymore."

He nodded slowly. "There is that," he said, as if he had forgotten it.

"So what are you doing here?"

"You've made a life for yourself," Arthur commented idly, taking a photo from her workstation. "A husband and son. How... domestic."

 _There is no such thing as a domestic life for us,_ he had said once. _Not with this kind of life. Just forget it._

Ariadne snatched the photo from him and replaced it next to her computer. "What do you want?"

"Your son doesn't look like your husband," Arthur said, crossing his arms over his chest.

She could feel adrenaline course through her. "I'm the subject, aren't I?"

Arthur merely smiled, but it was chilling to see. It wasn't a friendly smile at all, as if none of their prior history had ever happened. Dread curled in her stomach at the sight of it, and she suddenly worried if she was going to wind up dead in the Potomac River. "I always did appreciate your intellect, Ariadne."

"I'm not even a partner in the firm. I don't know anything important to steal."

"Is that so?"

"I'm just an architect, Arthur. I left the old life behind." She kept her eyes on his face and her jaw set. "I still believe there are some lines I shouldn't cross."

"Of course there are," he replied in a mocking tone. He had never shared her belief, and the cold glint in his eyes made her very, very afraid. "You always took things so personally."

"We invaded _minds,_ Arthur. There have to be limits for that kind of thing."

"It's just business," he said, lips stretched into a grimace of a smile. "You should have remembered that."

Ariadne tried to run for the door, but he caught up with her quickly and tackled her to the ground. He twisted her arm up behind her, his breath heavy on the back of her neck. "What are you going to do to me, Arthur?" she asked, almost cringing. His touch was rough and impersonal, as if they had never slept together, as if there had never been a relationship.

"This isn't personal, it's business. Just remember that."

His voice was flat and cold, and Ariadne could feel tears well up behind her closed eyelids. "What do you want?"

"Your husband's up for reelection soon."

She let her head fall to the carpet. It was that industrial crap that the firm had, nothing like the carpet at home. In her dreams, she still remembered the feel of the Oriental rug that had been in Arthur's apartment. She could still feel it press into her bare back in her dreams, Arthur hovering over her. This was nothing like those dreams.

"What does this have to do with me?"

"He's guarded at all times and armed to the teeth. Who funds him?"

Ariadne remained stubbornly silent. Arthur twisted her arm further up her back, and Ariadne cried out in pain. He never used to do this to her, never. The last of her illusions about him were shattering, and she just wanted to howl in disappointment.

"It's you, isn't it? All those ill-gotten millions you don't want anyone to know about?" Arthur asked, quiet menace in his tone. "Should I check those offshore accounts? Or have you moved them since I last saw you?"

"I'm surprised you don't know the answer to that already," Ariadne ground out through clenched teeth. "Don't you know everything about everybody?"

"I kept up my end of the bargain, Ariadne. _You_ left _me,_ and I left you alone." Arthur's grip was punishing on her arm, and his weight over her was almost suffocating. "So do we need to do the dance that we always did with the subjects? Or will you just tell me what I want to know?"

Ariadne kept her eyes and lips shut tight. The hollow thing that was her chest didn't allow her enough breath to speak anyway.

Arthur pushed her arm further up along her back, and Ariadne let out a choked sob. "Do we really need to do it this way, Ariadne?"

"Just business, is it?" she spat bitterly. "Or is this your way of getting back at me?"

"You have to be important for your leaving to hurt."

Oh, God, hearing that hurt so much. Ariadne stopped fighting against his grip and felt Arthur's weight press down heavily into her. "Is that all you want?"

Arthur didn't seem to react to her defeated tone. "How much did you pay out?"

"Does it matter?"

"It does to my client."

"I don't even know. I just signed over one of the accounts."

Arthur got up abruptly, and Ariadne just drew her arm tightly against her torso. She didn't even try to move yet. This Arthur was so much colder and crueller than she ever remembered him capable of being. When nothing happened, she pushed herself up to a sitting position. Arthur was looking at photos of her son in her workstation. "Does your husband know he's not Theodore's father?"

"He's Theo's father in every way that counts," Ariadne said tightly, pushing herself up to her feet.

"He has my eyes," Arthur remarked. Ariadne didn't say anything as he put the photo back on her desk. "He had a birthday recently, didn't he?"

"He's ten now."

"It really has been a long time, then."

They both just stared at each other for a moment. Arthur reached out and touched her face, and Ariadne flinched at the contact. "Are you really that afraid of me, Ariadne?"

"Shouldn't I be?"

Arthur's smile had sinister overtones. "Yes, I suppose you should be."

He struck her upside the head, and she collapsed to the ground.

When Ariadne came to, she was seated at her workstation and her right arm hurt. She frowned and tried to figure out why she felt so achy and groggy. The encounter with Arthur came back to mind, and she shivered. Something told her to check her arms, and she saw the small needle marks from the PASIV on the inside of her right elbow. The breath rushed out of her at the sight of it, the confirmation that she had simply been a subject for him. She looked up at the photographs on her desk and burst into tears as she reached for her phone. Her husband picked up right away. "Ari? Where are you? I've been trying to reach you for hours?"

Ariadne could barely get the syllables out. "I'm at work. Come get me. Please, honey, please come get me."

He didn't ask questions until she was back at home and sitting on their bed. She simply rolled up her sleeve and showed him the marks. "Charlie... Someone paid someone to get into my head to find out things about you. I think for the campaign."

"I don't care about that," Charles said, rolling her sleeve back down.

"But the campaign..."

"What do they have? That you used to be on the other side of dream work? That Theo isn't my natural son?" Charles watched her flinch. "What? What else is there?"

"No, it's not even... There's nothing else to find..." Ariadne said, beginning to sob again. God, she was glad Theo was asleep and couldn't see her falling apart like this. "There isn't... I couldn't keep at that job long enough to do anything..."

"We talked about that, and the campaign manager is aware of it. If anything, it only proves my commitment to getting dream work regulated."

"Charlie..."

"It was him, wasn't it?" he asked quietly. "Theo's father?"

Ariadne grasped his arm with a tight grip, almost tight enough to bruise. "You're Theo's father. You're the only one that counts."

Charles quietly peeled her fingers from his arm. "He made you afraid, didn't he?" he asked in a quiet voice. He had always known about her past, and it had never really mattered before now. It had never felt quite so real.

"I was just business," Ariadne whispered, looking at him desperately so that he could understand. "I thought he was going to kill me."

Charles pulled her into a tight hug. "We'll get through this, Ari, we will. It doesn't matter if I win or not, you know. We could always go back to how things were before politics. Settle down nice and quiet somewhere. I could be a mayor. It doesn't have to be Congress," he said soothingly.

"You'd hate it," Ariadne whispered against his chest, holding him tightly.

"Yeah, but I'd get used to it if I had to."

Ariadne pulled back and wiped at her eyes. She shook her head vehemently. "No. I couldn't do that to you, Charlie..."

He reached out and touched her face, almost unconsciously mirroring the movement Arthur had made before. Ariadne didn't flinch from it, but leaned into his touch. "I promised you forever, Ari. I meant it. For better or for worse. We'll figure this out."

She smiled at him and nodded. Ariadne gave him a kiss. "I should go check on Theo."

"He's not a baby, honey."

"No, but _I'll_ feel better."

Charles laughed and waved her off. He waited a beat after she left and brought out his cell phone to call his campaign manager. "Yeah. He made his move. They wound up using the ex for the extraction. Eliminate him, will you? I don't want Ariadne worrying about him ever again." He smiled at the affirmative response he got. "Thanks. You're a life saver."

Charles' smile slipped as he hung up. If Arthur could terrify Ariadne and say it was just business, he could be neatly gotten rid of.

It wasn't personal, it was just business.

The end


End file.
